Grid Alternatives takes solar to low-income homeowners

Grid Alternatives, a nonprofit that funds and installs solar power equipment for low-income families using volunteer labor, has its eye on expansion.

Founded in Oakland in 2001 during the state’s energy crisis, the little nonprofit has grown to eight offices including seven in California and one in Colorado. It’s looking for new partnerships to expand across the country and will begin a pilot program in New York and New Jersey in coming months.

So far, the company installed solar to save families $82 million on electricity bills, including $21 million in the Bay Area alone. The nonprofit installed solar on 200 homes in the Bay Area in 2012 and so far has installed solar on 93 homes in the Bayview-Hunters Point neighborhood. The hands-on volunteer experience is also workforce development training and counts toward hours required for solar installation certification.

Grid’s funding comes from a variety of sources and it gets donations of materials and money from local companies including Applied Materials, Salesforce.com and Chevron, Enphase Energy, Sunpower Corp., Wells Fargo, Yingli Solar, Suntech Power and others.

It hosted a women executive build Friday May 3 where cleantech executives installed solar panels on a home in San Francisco’s Visitacion Valley neighborhood on the edge of McLaren Park.